The field of the invention pertains to automobile and truck windshield wipers, and in particular to improvements to overcome the buildup on windshield wipers in freezing weather.
Most persons living in northern temperate regions and arctic regions have experienced the agony of frozen windshield wipers and the ice build-up on the windshield wipers and windshield in the winter. Heat from inside the vehicle, even with the defroster on, takes considerable time to penetrate outside to melt the ice and snow on the windshield. Heat from inside the vehicle is rarely effective to melt ice build-upon the wiper mechanism itself. Therefore, after starting the engine, one must exit the vehicle with the engine running, brave cold, wind and possibly traffic to break this ice on the wipers and scrape ice off the windshield.
Under sleet storm conditions, the ice build-up can be continuous while driving despite a warm vehicle interior and defroster. Build-up under sleet storm conditions can create an extremely hazardous driving situation at highway speeds. Therefore, there is a definite need to melt snow and ice accumulations on the windshield and windshield wipers much faster and more efficiently than with interior defrosters which is the current technology in common use.
Electric resistance heating wire affixed to the exterior or embedded in the rubber of the wiper blade has been tried; however, this approach to heating the wipers has not come into common use, perhaps because the heating is not sufficient to prevent build-up on the wipers metal mechanism.